The Birth Story

I was due December 21st.

As Christmas crept closer I started to panic. My biggest worry with the whole pregnancy had been going into labour and not being home on Christmas morning to see T open his presents. 

Christmas morning arrived, I was still pregnant!! Yay :) 

So I got to see Ts face as he came in and saw all the presents under the tree. My eyes filled with tears of happiness.

We had a lovely Christmas Day with our families, I got my first onesie 

Boxing Day morning arrived, still pregnant, quite happy about that as traditionally my family spends Boxing Day together. Another lovely busy day, took T to the toy shop afterwards to spend some of his Christmas presents, then home to relax after a lovely but exhausting day. 

At midnight my contractions started, instantly 3 minutes apart lasting 30 seconds. I tracked for about half an hour before ringing the hospital, because I had a 12 hour labour with T, I was told to go straight in at the first sign of this labour. So I called to ask if they meant first sign or give it an hour or two. I was advised that I could come in when I was ready but to give it an hour or so. 

12:45 I called my Dad, he was coming to stay in the house with T, so he turned up about 1am. 

I guess we left the house around 1:10am, contractions were still coming big and strong, Hubby was flapping a little bit, I kept reminding him of things we needed and telling him it was fine and to calm down. My waters hadn't broken by then so I picked up a dog towel to sit on in the van. 

Hubby asked should he be driving normally or quickly. I said somewhere in between.

As we got closer to the hospital my contractions stronger and longer I did ask him to run a red light, my bad.

At the roundabout before the hospital I needed to push. Now when I was labouring with T I needed to push a good 4 hours before he was born but I was told I wasn't ready and to breathe through them, even though no one checked to see how far along I was. So I just presumed this was the same, I had a bit of a push, my waters EXPLODED, pleased I remembered the towel but seriously wasn't enough. 

Hubby pulled up outside the hospital entrance, came round to get me out, I did a huge push again and knew she was coming, told Hubby to go get the midwife, Hubby panicked slightly and started yelling, 'shit, shit, shit' repeatedly  I had my feet up on the dashboard and was reclining the seat ready. A man outside the entrance helpfully got us a porter and a wheel chair. Hubby tried to get me to in the wheelchair. I said no, not being stubborn but I knew I was very close to her coming out!

Then 2 midwives appeared and told me to get in the wheelchair cause it was far too cold to give birth outside. I waited for the next contraction to pass and got out, they told me to kneel on the wheelchair and hold on to the back. 

As we whizzed through the hospital corridors I needed to push again, the midwife told me to try and breathe through it, I did. Then as we were waiting for the lift, I pushed and started crowning, midwife had hand on top of head, got in lift, she told me to push a little bit more, I obliged, she confirmed the head was coming. Got wheeled into delivery room, they whipped my trousers down to my knees, told me to push and out she came. 1:34am weighing 9lbs. 

Hubby crouched at the back of the wheelchair and kissed me, telling me how gorgeous she was and laughing his head off. I then managed to get out of my ever so glamorous position in the wheelchair and climb onto the bed whilst the midwives sorted me out. Baby E was having a good scream and Hubby decided to call my Dad, as we'd only left 20 minutes earlier and sent out texts to everyone. 

Very smitten Hubby got cuddles whilst I got all stitched up, apparently looking like a 'patchwork blanket' according to the midwife, basically her exploding out of me like that tore me from top to bottom!

There was an issue though, there was meconium in my waters so we had to stay in for baby to be monitored for 24 hours, I was devestated. I've never stayed overnight in hospital before, her heart beat was irregular as well. They showed me up to the ward by 5am and Hubby had to leave, he could come back at 10am. 

A lovely midwife came and explained stuff to me, a paediatrician checked E over at 7am and said she was totally fine, as long as the next few checks on her were ok she was happy that we went that evening. I was so happy to hear that.  The next checks were done around 11am and that nurse said even though everything was fine we would not be discharged till the following lunchtime. Long story short on that one, I begged each time I saw her to go home, I would be straight back if I thought anything was wrong, I tried bribing her with a chocolate orange and nothing :( so I had a good cry. 

At 10pm the midwife from early morning came back and was surprised to see me there still, she said she would try and get the discharge sorted during the night so I could go first thing. The same paediatrician came in and she was equally as surprised, she took baby off for her checks and came back said they were all perfect. The midwife returned at 11pm and said they were happy to make an exception and I could go there and then.... Kind of them but I don't drive, the car seat was in the back of Hubby's van and everyone was asleep!

So I spent most of that night having a cry, baby decided she would only sleep on me so I had to stay awake all night as I was frightened about rolling off the bed, also the ward was about 9 billion degrees and I had the most annoying woman on my ward who pressed the alarm to call the midwives every bloody hour. 

Thankfully my amazing Hubby came with T to get me at 7am and take us home! 

So that was babys' birth story 

Here is baby E and this is a picture of her and the proudest big brother in all the world: 

And now the adventure really starts!!! 

Enter Sandman and Things That Shouldn't Be Talked About!!!

I'm enjoying the challenge of trying to use song titles as titles!

Well the OH said my blog was getting a bit stale so any suggestions as to how to spice it up would be more than welcome if I'm boring you!

The Enter Sandman title is brought about because T is doing nothing but sleep at the moment!

He's literally lasting no longer than an hour between naps, which I'm finding rather odd, the last 2 days have consisted of feed, play for half an hour, 15 minutes of whinging, 45 minutes of sleep, then repeat.

 Apart from on an afternoon where he's trying to sleep for 3 hours +. I keep waking him up as I'm sure he's not supposed to be sleeping that long.

Bedtime routine has been established, bed now at 7pm, he's sleeping through to anywhere between half 2 and 5, then back to sleep till 6/6:30am.

So if anyone has any ideas on why he's sleeping so much they would be greatly appreciated!

Well I said in one of my previous blogs that I was considering sharing the physical effects after labour, and I've decided that I'm going to do that (anyone squeamish stop reading now!)

I think it's important to know what can happen, I didn't know the problems I would have.

I was extremely lucky in the fact that I didn't put any weight on throughout pregnancy, and lost 2 stone from the day I gave birth, and I didn't get one stretch mark. I don't know how I acheived that, I think regular badminton playing pre-pregnancy may have helped pull me back in shape very quickly, but I used no oils or anything to prevent stretch marks.

The one thing I've suffered with all my life are heavy periods. I mean stupidly heavy, but they were a breeze compared to what my first period, post labour, was like.

Nothing escaped the leaks, I leaked through 3 pads and onto my sofa, within an hour of changing them. I couldn't leave the house, I've never done so much washing in a week. The sofa thing was the worst though, I was so so so so SO embarrassed, I tried scrubbing it out before anyone found out and I was crying the whole time I was doing it.

I need not have feared the OH was so understanding and lovely, I had to sit on towels, sleep on towels, I felt like I was a baby myself!

Since then I've had 3 other periods and they are either ridiculously heavy still, or extremely painful, the only way I can describe it is that my womb feels swollen and tender, and the cramps are just contractions all over again, I literally have to breathe my way through them. I've spoken to the Dr, about testing me for Endometriosis, she's said it's too early to tell if it's just my body settling down since labour or if I've caused some damage through labour.

It's very hard for me to write all that because periods are another thing that shouldn't really be discussed, and because of the consequences of them I get upset very easily talking about them.

The other problem I had/have again is not something widely discussed, the wonders of piles.

Never had them before and mine randomly appeared 2 weeks after giving birth. A lot of people get them during pregnancy and they have my hugest sympathies.

The first time I had a, errrm bowel movement (let's stay professional, poo would just make me giggle, just like I randomly laughed at the word bum earlier, very childish!) with piles, I was in tears, I had it whilst everyone else was asleep (I'm a paranoid pooper, I try to go when everyone is asleep) the sheer pain of it left me in tears, unable to sleep, I was in agony for about 6 hours. I went to the Drs the next day who brutally shoved a finger up my bottom to check it was piles and made me cry, he gave me some cream with some aneasthetic in it.

This did not help, or if it did I dread to think how much it would have hurt!

The agonising pain (for those who've not had it, basically think about passing a knife through your bottom, a big big sharp one, and there's just as much blood!) lasted probably for about 3 months, but it's now eased a huge amount, still slightly sharp pain, but nothing I can't cope with. My GP said they should heal and go in their own time, and I'm hoping that's what's happening!

So that's that all out in the open, I'm going to run and hide in a corner under a blanket and rock with shame!

Drs appointment on Tuesday in regards to PND, so will be interesting to see what she says, seems as I've still not taken my anti-depressents, bet I get a slap on the wrist for that!

Invaluable Advice

Due to the lack of support I received once T was born I decided to follow my instincts and it's not let me down yet, here's some advice that got me through from pregnancy to now!

If in doubt google it: The amount of questions a paranoid pregnant woman/first time mother comes up with is insane, every pain, tingle, cough sneeze is cause for worry. I would have gone crazy with stress if i didnt have google. I googled EVERYTHING, and you know what, everything I googled came back with thousands of posts from similiar people querying the 'silly' things. Reading them make you realise you're not alone, not crazy and there's people who are in the same boat. How mothers 10 years ago coped is beyond me, I would have been at the drop in clinic every day if I with a list of questions as long as my arm!

Do what's best for you: The amount of conflicting advice you receive is RIDICULOUS! You've already got baby brain, the last thing you need is it baffling! Breast v Bottle, Front v Back, Co-Sleeping...so on and so forth. Take on board all the advice you receive, try what you want and stick with it from there. Below is my experiences with those 3 things!

Breast v Bottle: You get bombarded with 'breast is best' from the day you find out you're pregnant, but what about those that can't?! Where's the support for them? It riles me! I breast-fed for 6 weeks, and I'm proud. But only one Dr out of all the people I saw congratulated me for sticking with it for that long, everyone else tutted and said you should have carried on for 3 months. I got no support, no one showed me how to do it, or deal with any problems that arose, so I managed to breastfeed him for 6 weeks then get him onto bottles with just the help of my other half.

Front v Back: This is in regards to how the baby sleeps. Midwives and health visitors HAVE to tell you to get the baby to sleep on his back because of the results of all the cot death studies, and thats fine. BUT, only 20 or so years ago, it was advised that babies slept on their fronts, as it reduced the risk of choking if the baby was sick in their sleep. That, to me, is a much more logical arguement, there has been no actual proof of what causes cot death, just factors that may increase it. I don't understand how you fix something when you dont know what the cause is. I put T down to sleep on his front after about 3 weeks, mainly because he suffers from reflux and I was more worried about him choking, also reflux is like adult heartburn so when you laid him on his back it caused him pain, which at the beginning led to the next problem....

Co-Sleeping: There are logical arguements for and against this, logic says dont do it because you heighten the risk of smothering the baby when you fall asleep. But if you're baby screams in pain when in his cot on his back, he's not allowed to sleep on his front, what's a sleep deprived mother to do when her boy happily sleeps soundly on her chest? So I tried it after lots and lots of researching on the internet, and I had a few wonderful nights of sleep, before his reflux was diagnosed and I made my decision to sleep him in on his front. The research brought up lots of arguements for co-sleeping; Britains one of only a very few countries that is strongly against co-sleeping, I think the rest of Europe it's very commonplace. What sold me on it's benefits was a report I found that showed the biological benefits of co-sleeping; If the baby gets confused with his breathing, he listens to your breathing and makes his the same, If baby gets too hot, mums body cools itself and vice versa. This amazed me, Scientists arguing with nature!
However...!
I did do co-sleeping for a few nights, but after the first two nights I got too comfortable with it, and I would roll over in my sleep, your instincts kick in and he was always placed in a safe position where he could breathe, but I got a bit unnerved that my brain was the reliable whilst I was asleep, admittedly it hadn't let me down but still. Also baby then gets used to falling asleep on mummy which makes getting them in their own cot even harder. So I stopped.

There ends my advice for today, I'm not saying what I have done was right, but it was right for me and my baby, and that's how it should be. Take on board other peoples advice, then make your own decisions. At the end of the day the saying 'mummy knows best' had to come from somewhere!

If you want to sound off using other mums, go to http://www.netmums.com/, great web-site for advice!

Don't be afraid to ask questions, no matter how silly you think they are!!! If it helps you destress then it's good for the baby.

That's all for now.

Some places i found my info:

http://www.breastfeeding.com/reading_room/co_slepping.html
http://kidshealth.org/parent/general/sleep/cosleeping.html
http://www.netmums.com/

Well....I'll catch you up

Well, I havent written since that first/last post, as bump (from here referred to as T) turned up bang on time!

Later that day I went out for a meal and a pub quiz with my OH, to distract me from the potential 2 week wait and to possibly celebrate our last night of freedom.

Halfway through the quiz when it was announced that we were in last place we decided to call it a night as I was exhausted (please remember this whilst reading the rest!) so we headed home.

After a cup of cocoa I collapsed into bed, snuggled up with OH  and with a quick rub of my tummy laid my head on the pillow to sleep.

I then heard an odd popping noise.

So I shifted position, and water gushed out of me.

"errrm, sweetie, my waters have broken"

"Are you sure?"

"I may drown"

However my contractions had not started, so with shaking hands I rang the hospital, they advised to come in within the next couple of hours and they would check me out.

So I waddled off for a cup of tea, with a self made nappy round me.

Went to hospital at 1am, 1cm, sent home.

3am, contractions started, 2 minutes apart within 10 minutes, kindly amused myself for a little while so OH could sleep, then went in the bath.

7am, ouchie, back to hospital, 1cm, sent home.

9am, big ouchie, made noise like dying giraffe, needed to push, back to hospital. Hospital tried to send me home again, but after i stood in front of the reception and had a contraction and push they put me in an observation room, gave me 2 paracetamols and said they'd be back at half 1 to exam me again.

About 11am they let me have a luverly lavender bath, I nodded off for a minute between every 2 minute contraction, OH was on lifeguard duty as he feared I would drown.

12 noon, back in room, midwife heard me trying to push and came in and told me off as I wasnt yet ready and I was putting myself and bump at risk.

1:30pm midwife came in, examined me, announced I was not far off, almost dilated, should be ready to go in about 4 - 6 hours she would go book me in to delivery suite so I could get some pain relief and get my water birth set up. But I was still not to push. She pulled my trousers back up and headed out. Immediately as she left I had a mega contraction and needed to push (I'd only had 2 paracetamols, pushing eased the pain) I then felt something in my pants....

My instant thought was 'sh*t she told me not to push and now my insides have fallen out' but instead i calmly said to my OH

'There's something in my pants'

He whipped down my trousers, shrieked, ran after the midwife screaming 'she's crowning!', midwife belted back in told me to push, i did, out bump came and was flung onto my chest.

I laughed my head off, for ages. I'd mentally geared myself up only 20 minutes before for at least another 4 hours of pain, and I was done, he was here! 2 Paracetamols baby! How hardcore am I!?

7 Hours later T and I were home (For any first time mums reading this, please please PLEASE try and stay in hospital, I HATE them and fought tooth and nail to get home, however I'd had no proper sleep for over 36 hours and still havent yet! Wish I'd stayed in, but my faith in the hospital was very knocked considering i'd practically done it all myself as they clearly thought I was a nightmare first time mother.)

The last 15 weeks in a nutshell:

Night 1: Had one of those Angelcare movement monitors, went off about 6 times the first night, ended up with him falling asleep on me and I went another night with no sleep.

A few hours old

Week 4: Baby diagnosed with reflux, exorcist sick after every feed and screams loudly when put down on back, use phrase, 'only quiet when sleeping and eating' thats what the Drs look for!

Little sick!

Today: I have a beautiful, chilled out, happy, giggly, extremely strong baby boy. I'm loving mummyhood, apart from the further lack of support i received once i'd left the hospital, I've pretty much figured it all out myself with help from google!

My advice for the first 3 months, follow your instincts, there are pros and cons for everything that has ever been discussed for a baby, do what makes you feel happy!

Now hopefully I can update this more regularly with my new findings of motherhood!